


The Only Thing Worse Than Not Knowing

by paradisecity



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Canon Divergent after 3a, Canonical Character Death, F/M, Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-02
Updated: 2014-02-02
Packaged: 2018-01-10 20:50:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1164378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paradisecity/pseuds/paradisecity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles changes after the Nemeton and wrestles with what that means for him. </p>
<p>
  <i>It worries Derek, because this is never what Stiles was intended to be. Scott is their conscience, but Stiles used to hold their humanity. He was meant to be their brightness and laughter, not their dogs of war.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Only Thing Worse Than Not Knowing

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to thelostcity for the wonderful beta.

Scott has loved and will always love Stiles. This is a fundamental truth about Scott's life, one he accepts with the unshakable faith born of childhood playgrounds and sleepover secrets. He can't imagine a version of his future where Stiles isn't by his side, filling in the empty spaces and making Scott whole.

So Scott doesn't understand why Stiles starts to change, why it feels like he's pulling away even though there's nothing clear enough for Scott to point out to someone else and say, _Here, this is what I'm talking about, do you see it, too?_ All Scott knows is that Stiles suddenly feels different and inaccessible, as though he's someone who looks like the friend Scott loves so much but clearly isn't. It confusing and it hurts, in a way breaking up with Allison never did.

Scott finds, suddenly, that his faith isn't quite so strong.

\------

The Stiles who existed before the Nemeton is so vastly different from the one who exists after. Before, Derek would have defined him by innocent curiosity, guileless humor, and  steadfast loyalty. After, Derek defines him by the staggering weight of both past and anticipatory grief and he sees Stiles responding in the only way thinks will make a difference: by becoming harder and sharper.

Stiles learns mythical lore and magical theory from Deaton, makes the kinds of gruesome improvements to their armory that only someone with first-hand knowledge of creatures supernatural and a wicked imagination can envision, and becomes far more willing to craft plans of attack that lean toward lethality. Stiles before was a force to be reckoned with, but Stiles after is _dangerous_ in a way Derek never anticipated.

It worries Derek, because this is never what Stiles was intended to be. Scott is their conscience, but Stiles used to hold their humanity. He was meant to be their brightness and laughter, not their dogs of war.

The first time they test Stiles' aerosolized wolfsbane grenades in the field, it's to neutralize an encroaching rival pack that's been slowly migrating south from Washington. They've made nuisances of themselves but haven't caused any notable damage, which is why Stiles' grenades are intended to stun and not kill.  

They work flawlessly. Chastened and weakened, the pack's alpha is appropriately deferential. He explains why they're on the run and Derek makes no concessions as they negotiate for the pack's safe passage.

But what Derek tastes in the back of his throat for the rest of the night isn't victory. It's the visceral _rightness_ of the other alpha's focus on him and Stiles to the exclusion of all others, his assumption that Stiles is Derek's second in command despite the fact that he stinks of fragile human. Derek jerks off again and again thinking of Stiles' delicate fingers as he assembles their weapons, the confident timbre of his voice as gives orders only minimally disguised as suggestions, the steady beat of his heart as he stares down an alpha at Derek's side as though that's where he belongs.

Derek hates himself only a little as he comes, his stomach and chest already a shameful mess. He knows he'll hate himself so much more the next time he sees Stiles' warm eyes, and remembers how young and innocent he used to be.

\------

Deaton's role as an emissary is to assess and advise. He's meant to do this as objectively as possible, without judgment. Judgment colors one's interpretations, clouds one's opinions. If a pack is struggling, it's even more important that their emissary remain neutral so as to provide the guidance the pack so clearly needs.

Deaton has never claimed to be particularly good at his job where the Hales are concerned.

Talia led her pack by brute force. All she understood about power was how to wield it like a blunt object. She had no sense of subtlety, of nuance. She had no use for harnessing her pack's humanity or leveraging the strength of their loyalty.

Derek leads like Talia and it's why he fails so miserably. As a born wolf, he doesn't understand how viciously protective their inherent frailty makes humans; how in the absence of heightened concrete sensory input they have no choice but to rely on nebulous ties like friendship, love, and faith. 

Derek works against the people who would be pack long enough that eventually -- and for his own reasons; that's easy enough to see for anyone who cares to look -- Stiles begins to work with him. It's a worrisome shift for many reasons and Deaton feels moved to intervene.

"Stiles," he says, calling a halt to the motion of Stiles' hands as he mixes yet another powder likely to become the next in his line of increasingly lethal weapons. "Perhaps it's time you think about what you're doing and whom you're doing it for."

As interventions go, it may not be much. But it's so much more than he should have said, because he did it for Stiles' benefit with no regard for the risk it might eventually pose to Derek.

It's clear to Deaton that he hasn't gotten better at his job over time.

\------

The summer before Stiles' senior year is oppressively hot, days fading into one another like overexposed photographs. Everything is sweat-slick and humid, and just breathing is a palpable weight on Derek's chest.

But in the heat, Stiles is incandescent. While everyone else is feeling a wrung-out discomfort, he's feeling a pleasure that's so easily evident it's nearly ostentatious. Derek can't look away.

Stiles doesn't want him to; that much is clear. Stiles' body is an open invitation and he extends it to Derek at every opportunity. But in the name of self-preservation, Derek declines as best he can and tries to keep himself at a distance. He still ends up feeling distinctly like prey.

It's a slow, dirty build all summer. Derek thinks of driving into the city after the sun goes down and Stiles stops burning so brightly, thinks of picking up nameless women in bars and fucking them in dimly-lit bathrooms and alleys where he can't see their faces.

He never does.

It comes to a head in July. The moonlight silvers the planes and angles of Stiles' body as he backs Derek against the kitchen counter. The others' laughter echoes outside the renovated Hale house, answering the siren call of summer.

"Is it a question of can't or won't?" Stiles asks. "Because I know it's not a question of want."

Derek's deep breaths are only close to steady. Stiles waits him out. "No."

"That's not the question I asked."

Derek forces himself to meet Stiles' eyes. "It's the only answer you're going to get," he says, and walks away before he does something he desperately desires but can't afford.

\------

The anniversary of Claudia's death is hard for both of them, even after all these years. Brick doesn't know if it'll ever get any easier. He thinks maybe it shouldn't, at least not for him.

When Stiles was younger they'd both stay home on the anniversary itself. As Stiles got older and lost some of the natural resiliency of childhood, they started taking more time off together. Stiles struggles at school, completely unable to focus, and he's prone to explosions of bitter temper that are normally so unlike him. And Brick...Brick just _aches_ , with grief and guilt and longing and a hundred other things he can't even name. Just outside his periphery is the memory of Stiles, so young and small, curled up into himself and clinging to Claudia's hand with a lost child's desperation.

Her body was cool to the touch by the time he got to the hospital. He found out later a nurse had taken Stiles out of Claudia’s room and sat with him for a while, but he snuck back in the moment he was able to because he didn't want his mother to be alone. It's one of many things Brick will never forgive himself for.

It takes everything he has to focus on what's in front of him and not the memories that try to haunt him from the edges. But today he needs to do just that. It's the day after the anniversary itself and now that he and Stiles feel just a little less raw, they're taking a drive to the coast and heading to Claudia's favorite hole-in-the-wall restaurant. They'll eat her favorite fish tacos while they hold on to their grief, then try their best to let it wash out with the tide. 

"Come on, kiddo!" Brick calls up the stairs. "If you don't hurry up we won't make it before lunch and I know how you feel about linner."

"The combining of meals is an inherently more workable concept ante meridiem," Stiles agrees easily as he comes down the stairs two at a time. "Post meridiem it's like John McClane leaving the house on Christmas: a bad idea. But the newer movies actually disprove the Christmas hypothesis, so..."

They drive westward while Stiles expounds on Die Hard. His hands are strong and sure as they whirl in constant motion, his voice is a cadence as familiar as his childhood heartbeat used to be, and Brick loves with him a fierceness that stopped taking him by surprise long ago.

Their day passes peacefully. They watch the last wave of summer revelers on the beach and keep the conversation light as they eat. They're both aware of how close their grief is to the surface, even it's something neither of them want to explicitly acknowledge.

Brick almost starts the conversation he wants to have half a dozen times, but he can't quite bring himself to do it. Having Stiles to himself is such a rarity and he's loath to disrupt what's turned into a quietly pleasant day. But he's waited far too long already to have this conversation; he knows Claudia would be disappointed in his reticence, especially when all it's doing is masking cowardice.

They're headed back to Beacon Hills, two hours outside the city limits, when he finally manages to ask, "Are you okay, Stiles? Really okay?"

Stiles stops idly drumming along to Fleetwood Mac as he turns down the radio and shifts his attention to Brick. "What do you mean?"

"You've seemed...different. For a while. Kind of a long while." At first Brick thought it was just Stiles growing up, getting older. But there's a line of the tension that's settled itself in his shoulders and never left, a stillness in the way he holds himself sometimes that's completely unnatural.

Stiles shrugs. "My life is pretty much a bad comic book origin story. Of course I'm different."

"Stiles," Brick says, and it comes out more sharply than he intends.

Stiles is quiet for a long time, but it's the kind of quiet that means he's trying to gather his thoughts. Brick watches the broken yellow lines on the macadam blur into one another and worries.

Finally Stiles says, "I just...it's the supernatural stuff. I'm really good at things I don't want to be good at. I mean, there aren't exactly Geneva Conventions so I'm pretty much in the clear. But I figured out I was good at this stuff before I figured out whether or not I wanted to be. I probably should've done that first."

Brick sees a much younger Stiles in his periphery again and feels like he's failed in an entirely new way. "Stiles. You can always stop."

"No, not now. Not with the stupid beacon broadcasting. Maybe later, but not now."

Brick wishes fervently that Claudia were here. He thought when she died there might be some sort of compensatory parenting mechanism that would make this easier, make him better or more capable, but there isn't. He's not the parent Stiles needs or deserves. She was.

Hearing the stubbornness in Stiles' voice, he lets that thread of conversation go and reaches for the one he wants even less. "How have you been doing since you and Derek broke up?"

Stiles gives him the stunned fish face that Brick typically associates with too much Adderall. It would be funny in any other circumstance, but here it just feels too innocent and out of place. "Holy shit, you actually--"

"Language," Brick warns mildly.

"--thought we were dating?"

Brick shifts uncomfortably. Oh, how he doesn't want to have this conversation. He aims for neutral but his tone is rough when he says, "I'm not as dumb as I apparently look, Stiles. I just didn't know what to say. An older man coming around your teenage son isn't exactly covered in the parenting handbook. It's definitely covered in the sheriff's handbook, but that wasn't a blueprint I was prepared to work from where my own son was concerned." He pauses, blowing out a long breath, then says what he's been trying to say all along. "I'm sorry. I should have done something. I didn't know what to do, but I should have figured something out."

Stiles gives him a one-armed shrug, discomfort plainly written in the lines of his body. "No need. There was nothing going on."

Brick's disbelief nearly gets the better of him, but the sharp echo of _Mom would have believed me!_ comes all too easily to mind. Instead, all he asks is, "No?"

Stiles shakes his head and huffs out a little laugh. "Not for lack of trying on my part," he admits.

Brick hums consideringly and takes a minute to reorient himself. This wasn't at all the conversation he expected to find himself having. He's tried hard not to think about Derek and Stiles in any sort of joint romantic or sexual capacity -- and he's ashamed of that, because that's his duty as a father -- but now that he needs to offer comment on the situation he doesn't know what to say.

He thinks about Stiles, about how many small hurts and shards of anger have accumulated over the years and how he masks them with his quick wit and sarcasm. He thinks about how deeply Stiles cares about others but how little of himself he actually shares with anyone who isn't Scott. He thinks about how clearly Stiles has been stung by Derek's rejection but how much worse things could have been had Derek gone the other way.

"That makes him a good man, Stiles," Brick concludes, and is only slightly surprised to find he means it. "I've seen the way you look at him. You don't look at him like he's a bad decision that'll make a good story. You look at him like he's a lot more than that. Maybe he's being careful with you. People should be careful with the things they care about."

Stiles shrugs and leans his head against the window. "I don't know. Maybe."

Brick has seen the way Derek looks at Stiles, too, and it makes his stomach knot up with anxiety and the need to protect. This is how Brick knows Stiles is growing up: the things Stiles wants are the things Brick fears the most.

But Stiles is almost a man now and this is how it's supposed to be. He'll leave California when he goes to college -- he'll feel guilty about it and won't want Brick to know, but Brick has known since Claudia died that Stiles would leave as soon as he could -- and he'll have an entire life that Brick doesn't know much about. Brick will miss Claudia and Stiles both and he'll feel desperately alone until he figures out how not to.

But he and Stiles have one more year together and he's going to try his damndest not to make the same mistakes again. "I'm trying," he says. "I know sometimes it's not enough, but I'm trying. And Stiles, I'm always here."

"I know." Stiles gives him a small smile. "Thanks." Then, apparently at his limit for father/son conversations of import, he reaches over and turns the radio up. He listens for a moment and then says, "Ha. Before I understood what 'beast of burden' meant, I thought Mick Jagger was saying he'd never leave the pizza burning. A skill to appreciate, sure, but I had no idea what that had to do with staking his relational independence."

Brick chuckles softly. "Your mom was always getting lyrics wrong. Did she ever tell you the one about nuns in disguise?"

Stiles' eyes brighten a little. "No. Will you tell me?"

\------

"Hey," Stiles says, on a crisp fall afternoon when everyone else is out at the Apple Harvest Festival, playing at normalcy. He's leaning against Derek's door, backpack over one shoulder and eyes tight with tension. "Can I...?"

Derek's surprised to see him, much less to see him asking for something. They've given each other a wide berth since the summer and so much of the easy camaraderie they used to have has gotten lost in the distance. "What do you need?"

Stiles crosses to the dining room table. He pulls his laptop out of his backpack and when he does, glossy college brochures spill across the table in its wake. When Derek looks he's not surprised to see they're all for universities far away from Beacon Hills; there's not a California school among them.

"Privacy," he says.

It's easy, then, to understand: the others don't know. They're all sticking close to home and assuming Stiles will do the same. Clearly he intends differently.

Derek says, "Okay," with what he hopes is a blank-faced shrug.

Stiles works away, clicking and reading and taking notes on a color-coded spreadsheet while Derek tries hard to breathe like the wind hasn't been knocked out of him. He should have seen this coming but even if he had, advance warning and adequate preparation are two very different things. He has several years of subpar alphahood behind him to attest to that reality.

Three hours later, Stiles packs up his things. He hesitates at the door, picking at the frayed knot on the drawstring of his hoodie. It's a nervous habit Derek hasn't seen on him in quite some time. "What?"

"I have personal statements and essays and stuff for scholarships," Stiles says. "Next time, would you...help?"

Derek considers him more carefully. "Isn't that something your dad should do?"

Stiles' voice is sharper when he says, "Just, yes or no?" Derek sighs, then nods. "Fine," Stiles says, though he sounds angry.

Derek feels angry, too, and he's pretty sure neither of them could begin to explain why.

\------

They survived senior year. It's a simple truth, but no less impressive for its simplicity. The others believed it would happen based on nothing more than the fervent hope of the young and stupid, but Lydia's never been that naive. She knew the odds were not in their favor and she was right -- shutting down the beacon came at a high cost to all of them. So when the last day of classes is over, she celebrates the one way she always knew she would.

"Stiles," she says, grabbing him by the wrist and pulling him away from his slouch against the wall. "You're coming with me."

"But," he says, and gestures up the hallway, "Scott and Allison--"

"Trust me," she says, "this is going to be so much better."

She takes him home and fucks him outside, the brightness of the sunshine making her feel clean and new. It's hot, humid as the days begin their slide into true summer, and sweat dampens the hair against the nape of her neck and collects in the crooks of her elbows as she slips her fingers down Stiles' back. He's eager, excited; he would be if even she weren't his first, and she finds it almost as sweetly charming as the grass stains pushed into his knees from where he's working her wet and open with his mouth. He's inexperienced, clearly, but even here he's a fast learner, confident in his ability to read her body, to learn, to respond in kind. He's a force to be reckoned with and she feels a spike of conquering pleasure quickly spiral up into orgasm at the fact that she may be the only person who knows, truly _knows_ , this secret about him.

His hips easily pick up the rhythm she sets when she guides him inside her. He laughs when he comes, and she buries her answering smile in the long line of his neck; it's entirely too fond to be seen. She gives him a moment, then, though he's still half hard inside her when she flips them over. The way she rubs up against him as she pulls off has her gasping sharply. "Again," she says, gentle as she removes the condom, tying it off and reaching to her nearby purse for another. He'll be ready again soon.

"Lydia, I just--"

"We have all afternoon," she says, in a tone that brooks no argument, "and I'm just getting started."

"Well, in that case," he says, and his fingers are already unerring as he reaches for her.

She could have loved this boy, if she'd been a better person.

There's something about the kindness in his eyes when he smiles at her that says maybe she's not the only one who knows someone else's secret.

\------

The night before Stiles leaves for Boston, Derek drops in his window to say goodbye. He expects to listen to Stiles' worries about his father, his hopes that Scott will eventually come around and forgive him for being the last to know about Stiles' college plans.

What he doesn't expect is for Stiles to pin him in place with a look that's so familiar from the summer, knowing and heated, and say, "I'm not sixteen anymore. I'll be three thousand miles away from living in my father's house. If you want to do something about this thing we've been dancing around, about _us_ , now's the time. Because Derek, I'm not going to ask again."

In the freefall silence that follows, Derek _wants_. He wants so many things he's sick with it. But he can't let himself have any of them, and he knows all too well the reasons why.

What he says instead is, "Go to college, Stiles."

Stiles nods slowly. He takes a deep breath that's shaky on the exhale but his voice is steady when he says, "I'm out. I'll send you a compendium of everything I know, everything I've worked on. But don't contact me. I can't do this anymore. I'm out."

"Okay," Derek says quietly, after a long moment's silence. "If that's what you want."

The next morning when everyone gathers at the Stilinski's to see Stiles off to the airport, Stiles won't even meet his eyes.

\------

"So, Stiles," Ella says, and there's a seriousness in her voice that goes above and beyond their standing Tuesdays-are-for-Thai lunch date. "About this Orin."

"Yeah?" he says, trying his best not to look shifty.

"How are things going?"

"Fine."

"Really?" He nods. She frowns, and he's reminded again how much of Lydia he sees in her. "Because I haven't met him, Scott says he hasn't heard a word about him, and if it weren't for the fact that you usually seem a little more relaxed after you disappear for most of the night, I wouldn't necessarily believe that he exists at all. That's not exactly the way an ideal boyfriend behaves."

Stiles intensely regrets letting Ella have Scott's Skype handle. He knew no good would come of it. "He's not my boyfriend, El."

"Even if you downgrade him to a friend with benefits, that still implies friend, Stilinksi," she says, and he's wincing because he used to recognize a trap before he walked into one. He shovels more curry into his mouth. "Friend," she continues blithely, "means that at worst, I catch him sneaking into or out of our place on rare occasion. At best, it means lunch, a movie, some sort of mutually enjoyable social activity that precedes sex. But it most definitely means you're doing something other than shamefully fucking in his apartment where no one can see you. Are you doing anything other than shamefully fucking in his apartment, Stiles?"

Stiles nearly chokes on a carrot. "Ella," he hisses. "We're in _public_."

"It's cute that you're scandalized. I'm guessing the answer is no." She watches him for a moment, then sets her chopsticks down, all levity gone. "That's a dick move, Stiles. You're worth spending time with, whether your clothes are off or on. You're no one's dirty secret and I hate that I even have to have this conversation with you."

Stiles' stomach lurches. He doesn't know how to tell her that despite the fact Orin is a doctoral student, with more time, experience, and relationships under his belt than a mere sophomore, Stiles is one who's setting the limits. Orin is the one who wants to meet Stiles' friends, to introduce Stiles to his own. Orin is the one who's stopped using the word date but still chases the idea of spending time with Stiles in public during daylight hours like it's something exotic and alluring. Barring any of that, he'd settle for Stiles spending the night instead of trekking across campus at two in the morning, just once.

What Stiles is doing, not allowing any of that but continuing to sleep with Orin anyway, it's a dick move. Ella's right. He doesn't want to be that guy.

He goes over to Orin's later that night to break it off. Orin's hurt but more than that, he's surprised. That makes Stiles feels worse than anything has yet.

"My mom would be so disappointed in me," he says quietly, and though Orin knows nothing about Claudia, he takes it for the apology it is.

\------

The first time Derek runs into Brick after Stiles goes to Boston, they're in the parking lot of the grocery store. Brick's scowling like he wants to take a swing at Derek, so it surprises him when what Brick says instead is, "Thank you."

The dissonance gives Derek pause. "For?" he asks, after a moment.

"Helping Stiles with his college applications," Brick says. "I know it wasn't Melissa McCall, so I'm assuming it was you."

Derek nods, and they leave it at that.

The second time Derek runs into Brick is seven months after the first. They're in another parking lot, though this time it's the local community college where Derek's waiting to pick up Isaac after his last class of the day. Derek startles at the rap of Brick's knuckles on his window, too engrossed in the course catalog he'd been examining.

"Derek," Brick says, "I've got a case I could use your help with, if you're willing."

Derek gets out of the car, unwilling to be loomed over by someone in a position of authority who's tracked him down in a random location. Brick's tactics are unsettlingly familiar. "What kind of case?"

"I'm not exactly sure, that's the problem. But I think it's more up your alley than mine. This is typically the kind of thing I'd ask Stiles to help with, but…"

…but Stiles doesn't do this anymore. Derek nods, aiming for nonchalance and hoping nothing about the complicated snarl of emotions he feels at Stiles' name shows on his face. He's learned that missing someone who's dead is much less complicated than missing someone who's simply gone.

"Sure," he says, and that's how he ends up having dinner at a house that's achingly familiar a few days later, sorting through a fairly straightforward case of witchcraft gone awry before being sent home with enough leftovers to feed both Isaac and himself for days.

Brick consults with him on occasion after that, though since they shut down the Hills' eponymous beacon during Stiles' senior year there's relatively little supernatural activity serious enough to warrant a consult. After Isaac leaves the community college for a state school, Brick's invitations take on a different tenor and Derek finds himself slipping into something almost like friendship with one of the people least likely to seek the title. It's not hard to figure out why; the one thing they have in common in a hole in their lives that looks and sounds like Stiles.

Brick is happy to talk about him, his academic achievements and secondhand stories about his friends. Derek tries not to be too eager to listen, but he knows he fails. He invests his energy instead in pretending Brick isn't being intentionally generous with his stories about Stiles, because those are implications Derek doesn't have room to parse.  

He thinks about signing up for a class at the community college himself. He can't complete the civil engineering degree he started years ago but that part of his life is best left alone, anyway. It doesn't mean he can't try something new. He's not exactly surprised when he finds himself asking for Brick's opinion, nor is he surprised when Brick takes him out to celebrate the successful end of his first semester.

Time passes, as it does, and Derek finds himself somewhere near content. There's a part of him that feels like he'll always be grieving, but he's no longer doing it in ways that fuck up the lives of everyone else around him. It's small, as victories go, but it's definite.

Then one day in October Brick says casually but with clear intent, "Stiles is graduating early. He's decided to put off grad school for a while and come home instead," and Derek can't hear anything else Brick says over the roaring sound of _Stiles_ that fills his ears.

\------

Stiles is home for a month before he sees Derek. Derek sees him well before then, because old habits die hard and he needs to reassure himself that Stiles is alive and well and _home_.

Stiles comes to him on a pale day in mid-January, only a handful of clouds breaking up the cool winter sunlight. He knocks on Derek's door and the sound is hollow and foreign; Derek can't remember if he's ever stood on the formality before.

"Hey," he says, when Derek answers. He spreads his arms wide as though presenting himself, though there's a hint of hesitation in the gesture. "So I'm back in town."

Derek takes a moment to observe him. There's more certainty in the lines and weight of his body, and it's reflected in the way he carries himself. He's wearing glasses now, and while he looks older -- though not necessarily more adult -- there's still the illusion of constant and barely restrained motion that feels inherently like Stiles. "I know," Derek says. "Your dad told me."

"It's weird that the two of are you are friends now."

"Yeah?" Derek says. He opens the door wider, allowing Stiles in.

"Yeah. I guess it makes sense, kind of?" he says, following Derek into the living room and settling tentatively into an armchair. "But still. You. My dad. Friends."

Derek shrugs. "You were gone for a while. Things change."

"Yeah," Stiles says. "About that."

The tone in the room shifts and it sets Derek on edge. But Stiles doesn't say anything more and the silence lengthens with time. Derek waits him out, disappointed to find he can't read Stiles as easily as he used to.

Finally, Stiles asks, "Do you know why I left?"

"No," Derek says. "Not for sure. But I can take a guess."

Stiles' lips twist into something not quite resembling a smile. "You're the one who helped me with those all applications, the one who knew about it the longest, and yet you're the only one who never asked me why."

"Did you want me to?"

"If you'd asked me then, I probably would've lied to you," Stiles says. "And maybe I would've thought I was telling the truth. I don't know. But if you asked me now, here's what I'd say: informed consent." He pauses then, takes a breath. "When people can't give it and have do the thing in question anyway, it kind of fucks them up. So when I had to protect my friends, my family? Of course I did. Especially since I was the one who got Scott turned into a werewolf and got us involved in all of this to start with. But I didn't really understand what protecting them meant. I didn't know how far I'd go to do that. And by the time I did, it felt like I was too deep in the middle of it to stop.

"And that's what I needed. To stop. To figure out what I was doing and why I was doing it and whom I was doing it for. I couldn't do that here. I had to leave."

"Okay."

Stiles frowns at Derek, then laughs softly. "You know, I'd kind of forgotten what having a conversation with you was like. And I'm using that term loosely, just in case you've forgotten the sound of my sarcasm."

Derek hasn't forgotten. He hasn't forgotten a single thing about Stiles. Having Stiles here makes him feel reckless, makes him want to tell Stiles these too-honest truths even though he knows he never could. But before he can come up with a suitable reply, Stiles continues. "Then I realized I was thinking about it all wrong. I was thinking there was an old Stiles who didn't know about any of this stuff, and a new Stiles who did and became a completely different person because of it. But there wasn't. There was just me. All along, there was just me.

"In Boston, the friends I had, the people I dated? They didn't know where my scars came from or why I thought old monster movies were funny but refused to watch movies about war. They knew pieces of me, but they didn't know all of me. The only people who do are here. And that's why I came back."

There's a lot that Stiles isn't saying and Derek isn't entirely sure how to read between the lines. He knows he plays a not-so-small part in all of this, particularly the parts that are hard to look at. Being associated with Derek has never really been good for anyone else. But those are things that will take longer to untangle, and Stiles is here because he needs something from Derek now. "Why are you telling me this?"

Stiles isn't as put off by the question as someone else would be, and Derek appreciates the proof that some of their friendship remains. "Because I don't want to just waltz back into town like nothing happened. I left, and that hurt some people. I'm not necessarily assuming you're among them, but...," he trails off, shrugs. "I guess I just wanted to explain. To take responsibility for my actions."

Derek shakes his head. "No, Stiles. There's a difference between growing up and leaving. Maybe you think you left, but I know you didn't. That's not what happened here."

Stiles blinks at him, then laughs, surprised and bright. "Look at you, all wise and perceptive."

"Yeah, well. I know a thing or two about leaving," Derek says, but his words are understanding and carry no trace of bitterness.

 "Okay, then." Stiles says. "I guess that's all I came to say." He hesitates like he's waiting for something else, then seems to change his mind and stands to leave. He makes his way to the door, hands shoved firmly in his pockets. "So I start my new job at the hospital soon and then I have to figure out the whole apartment thing. Because seriously, I'm not going to be that guy who comes home and lives in his childhood bedroom. Just no. But once I get that all figured out, maybe we can hang? It'll be a couple of months before the others come back, so I'll have some time on my hands."

That's...no. It's too vague and imprecise, especially when Stiles has been gone for so long. Derek always thought Stiles would come back to Beacon Hills, but he didn't know when it would happen. He wouldn't have been surprised if Stiles had stayed gone for ten years or more. Now that he's back, Derek's not letting him go so easily. They've had some time apart, some time to both grow up a little, and Derek thinks maybe now they have a fighting chance at making this thing between them actually work.   

He reaches out for Stiles' arm and stops him in the entryway, hearing clearly Stiles' warning from years ago: _Derek, I'm not going to ask again._ So Derek takes a breath and does the asking. "How about dinner this weekend?"

Stiles goes still and silent, and Derek realizes that he missed a step: he hasn't stopped wanting Stiles, but he never thought about what Stiles might want in return.

But before Derek can get ahead of himself, Stiles asks carefully, "Dinner?"

There's an implied question, and it takes everything Derek has to answer it. This will be a secret he never shares with Stiles: how something so simple and so important nearly got lost in the seas of his shame and fear.

He slides his hand down Stiles' arm and tangles their fingers together briefly before letting go, hoping Stiles can read his response for what it is. "Yes. Dinner."

Stiles' eyes are unreadable for a moment, then he breaks into a grin. "You're such a dick. You couldn't have done this years ago?"

Derek only just manages to hold back a sigh of relief, and covers with a frown. "You were _sixteen_ years ago."

"Yeah, and my dad thought we were messing around back then." Derek pales and Stiles crows. "Think about _that_ when you come over to my dad's for dinner. Which is what you're doing, by the way. It'll be an official date and everything. I'll tell my dad so he can clean his gun at the table since he didn't get to do that the first time around. I'm sure he'll appreciate the second chance."

When Derek grumbles, "Fine," with no protest, Stiles' eyes go wide with awe.

"Holy shit. You want this as much as I do."

The insistent slide of Derek's lips against Stiles' is answer enough.

**Author's Note:**

> So here's how this happened: I was snowed in during Polar Vortex 1.0 and I said to my friend J., "If I have to watch another episode of Frasier, it's going to become The Shining up in here," and he said, "For a palate cleanser, try Teen Wolf. It's kind of awful, but the boys are pretty!" So I did, and I said, "Aww, high school friends in love! No wonder the Stiles/Derek people feel so strongly about their ship," and he said, "Oh, that's not Derek," and I said, "WAIT, THAT 30 YEAR OLD CREEPER IS DEREK? Also, who let Stiles have those hideous red jeans and why does he keep wearing them?" 
> 
> And then 2.5 seasons and a few weeks later I decided J. was a horrible person, and then a few weeks after that I'd written this, despite the fact that I haven't written fic in years. (And despite that fact that I don't even ship these two. Run far away from the creeper, Stiles! FAR AWAY!) This is the terrible power of Teen Wolf, with which I'm sure you're all familiar.
> 
> Also, if you notice anything wonky, please feel free to point it out. 
> 
> (And yes, I know fanon consensus holds that the Sheriff's name is John. But when I saw him I said to J., "He looks like he has a 70s porn name, like Rod or Brick or Stone," and J. said, "Brick...HOUSE!" and now this is incorporated into our drinking game, which we play with tea because we're boring adults, but never let it be said that we are not the best hydrated adults in town by the time we're done with an episode.)


End file.
